


giant steps are what you take

by futureboy



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Normal Life, Alternate Universe - Office, First Kiss, Idiots in Love, M/M, The Kinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-30 01:43:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16755466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/futureboy/pseuds/futureboy
Summary: Gavin works two desks down from him, and if he can be counted on for anything, it’s the complete reliability with which he says Dumb Shit.[Michael works in an office, and his coworker is a maddening dumbass, but it all works out in the end.]





	giant steps are what you take

**Author's Note:**

> [RPF disclaimer: Written according to guidelines set by RT employees (to the best of my knowledge). This is a fictional series of events using characters inspired by real people.]
> 
> Title from ‘Walking on the Moon’ by The Police.

The thing Michael can’t stand about his job is Gavin. And considering how decidedly unglamorous his job is, he feels he’s making a bold statement.

Yeah, the thing he can’t stand _could_ be that the fastest, easiest job going in the area at the moment was in this building. In the IT department, no less. It could be the shitty software he has to use, because seriously, he asked the Service Desk and they confirmed it’s genuinely only three years younger than he is. It could be the drama caused by some the other members of his department. It could be that someone keeps stealing his cans of Red Bull from the mini-fridge. It could be any number of things.

Nope. Definitely Gavin.

Gavin works two desks down from him, and if he can be counted on for anything, it’s the complete reliability with which he says Dumb Shit. They’ve got the ability to hotdesk, which basically means they can plug their work laptops into any terminal and be able to pick up with work from there, but everyone’s carved out their own little space and the seating plan rarely changes drastically.

For this reason, Michael can’t just move away like _that_. He’s going to have to do it gradually, and discreetly, in order to minimise any dramatic gossip that might flare up.

So he’s kinda stuck there for a little while.

“Michael,” Gavin says, in the ridiculous way he does when he’s fishing for an answer. “Have you had your cases report through yet?”

“Nope. How come?”

“I wanted to compare,” he says, “I’m trying to see if I’ve got the high score for the most finished listings in the department.”

Michael feels annoyance flare up at his idiocy: “you can’t compare them like that,” he says, trying to keep his voice down at least a little, “each listing is totally different, a volume report is stupid. There’s no such thing as a high score when there’s no telling how long the listings in a day could take.”

“So what you’re saying is I’m the winner?” Gavin says smugly, pulling an exaggerated smirk.

“That’s the _opposite_ of what I’m saying.”

They live in a pretty similar direction away from the office, too, which is real shitty. Sometimes Gavin follows him out of the lobby at the exact same time. Luckily, Gavin gets the bus and Michael has to trudge to the closest parking lot, so their time spent walking in each other’s company is limited.

“How did this happen?” Michael huffs.

“I don’t know,” says Gavin, who has an headphone wire looped around the shell of his ear, and also hooked around his elbow and coat somehow. “Ryan’s missus reckons I’ve got headphone goblins in my pocket. They always get like this, even without me touching them.”

Michael reaches out a bluntly disappointed hand. “I think she means normal tangles, not your iPhone trying to throttle the shit outta you,” he says, snorting, and half-releases him from the confused mass.

It’s even worse if they share a lunch break. The department take breaks in half and halfs, and Michael’s one of the ones who takes whatever slot’s going according to everyone else’s plans. So sometimes he enjoys a peaceful lunch, and sometimes he really, really doesn’t.

“You know how if you lose a thumb, they can replace it with your big toe?” he asks, flicking the rim of his can of soda in a series of irritating metallic noises.

“What?!”

“It’s a thing.”

“Continue,” splutters Michael. He wants to get this over with.

“Well,” Gavin says thoughtfully. _Flick-clang._ “No-one ever talks about, like, the other fingers. Can you replace each finger with its partner toe?”

“It’s _partner_ toe?” Michael says incredulously, as Gavin starts to shake with emerging laughter. “The whole point of the big toe and thumb switch out is because they at least kinda match, surely! You can’t just replace the next finger with the shorter toe it goes with, moron.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a good fuckin’ job _you’re_ not my fuckin’ surgeon,” he sighs, shaking his head at his sandwich whilst Gavin periodically makes delighted noises. “Jesus Christ.”

Gavin dares to look up from his soda with a cheeky, boyish grin. “Imagine replacing your little finger with a pinky toe, Michael,” he giggles.

(He humours him - which, in reality, means that Michael couldn’t hold in his laughter and needed to disguise it as pity).

“You stupid fuck.”

“Michael, _no_.”

The phrase ‘Michael, _no’_ has frequented the inside of his brain as of late, bouncing off every available surface and blaring at top volume. He barely notices the two week period where his current manager is let go and replaced, and at first, there’s some days where he barely remembers his new manager exists at all.

Today is the first day he’s focused on it, because there’s a _seating plan_.

“What’s goin’ on?” he asks, startled, unsettled, trying not to be too loud but also _completely_ outraged, because Steffie’s in his seat.

“Sorry, man,” she shrugs, “new seating plan.”

“What about hotdesking?”

She shrugs again. “No more hotdesking, I guess.”

“Fuck,” Michael spits. His shoes hurt. He’s already got a headache coming on. “Where the hell am I sat, then?!”

Steffie winces. _Shit_. He knows exactly what’s coming, and it takes every ounce of strength he has to wrangle his feelings into submission, because fuck-off terrible as this might be he _really_ doesn’t want to get fired. “You’re over there… Next to Gavin.”

“Hi, Michael!” says Gavin loudly, grinning and waving like he’s not ten feet away.

“God help me,” Michael mutters quietly, and stalks over to accept his fate.

He kind of doesn’t mind, except that he does, a hell of a lot. Gavin’s desk is a _mess_. And his legs tend to do whatever they want, which usually involves clipping the spokes of Michael’s office chair. Gavin loves to mumble nonsense words and random paragraphs of body text to himself, and he also loves to spike up his hair in strange directions when things don’t go his way. Gavin loves to be a pain in the ass.

Gavin loves off the beat music, and also The Kinks.

Which Michael finds out when music players get banned during work hours.

“How am I supposed to focus _now_ ?” he whinges. “People have conversations over me all the time about stuff I don’t care about-- Actually, they bloody have conversations _across_ me! It’s distracting, Michael. _Michael_. This is bullshit.”

“I know,” says Michael, who is wishing for the mechanical-esque murmurings of Chromeo to drown out Gavin’s pissing and whining. “Guess that’s just new management. Now we have to, like, _talk_ to each other, how fuckin’ barbaric.”

Gavin smirks. “They’ll bring it back once they realise everyone has to chat with _me_.”

There’s a tight and nasty stab of discomfort through Michael’s sternum at that. The huffy little laugh doesn't quite reach Gavin’s eyes.

Michael tries not to complain about the music after that.

Their new manager is a slave driver. Two people hand in their notices within the week. Yeah, their productivity is way up, but stress levels are high and people keep crying at odd intervals. Michael grits his teeth and tries not to lose his temper too noticeably.

Gavin seems remarkably unaffected most days, but sometimes the pressure relieves itself through strange outlets.

“Oh, shit,” he says one day, completely blankly, and blinks at his screen a couple of times. Michael leans over. It must be bad if Gavin’s swearing straight away.

“What?”

“...I just lost all my work.”

“All of it?” Michael asks, faking irritation to get a rise out of him. “From the beginning of time? Was it work-work, or schoolwork too? Did your sixth grade Geography paper slip from your fingers? What the hell did you _lose_ , asshole, be more specific.”

The blankness slides away. He knows he’s won.

“Just the last case I was working,” Gavin laughs - a _real_ laugh - “I can do it again. It’ll only take five minutes.”

“Quit your bitching, then,” says Michael.

“But I was almost done for the day! I was just about to pack up.”

Michael focuses _hard_ on his screen. For some reason, he got the really weird urge to lean into Gavin’s space then. “Guess you just gotta clock out with the rest of us.”

“ _Damn_ it. It’s like I won a Formula One race a whole minute before anyone else, and then on the way home, my engine became a black hole.”

It doesn’t make any sense, and he feels a sense of duty to let him know.

The infuriating part is that Gavin’s Dumb Shit is actually starting to become… endearing. During quality control checking, for example, which some genius thought Michael and Gavin would be a good team to put in charge of it, he feels unfamiliar twisting in his gut as the afternoon slot rolls around.

They sit at desks beside each other and Michael thinks about how close their faces are. Looking at the same displays and trying to iron out the bugs. If he were to turn his head and look Gavin in the face, their noses would be touching.

Not too difficult a feat, he thinks, and the insult brings him back to Earth slightly. Better.

Yeah, much better.

They go for post-shift drinks with the department one night, and talk until everyone else has left, and then it’s just the two of them. And after that, they go for drinks a little more often. It becomes a thing: Gavin, tilting his head, might mutter ‘ _bevs?_ ’, and Michael, jutting his chin out, might say _‘yeah, alright’_. And then they’ll go for post-shift drinks.

Just the two of them.

He feels sick, most days. Like something’s trying to get out of his chest, Alien-style. He has to consciously look away from Gavin’s wetted lips and fidgeting hands. He notices the way he taps his shoes to an unheard beat, and the way his hands fly over a keyboard like he’s playing Mozart instead of formatting HTML.

Michael hates the way that they go on lunch breaks together and he hates walking out of the lobby with him. He’s so mad he could spit.

“Aw,” says Gavin. The corners of his mouth turn down in disappointment. His hands are deep in his coat pockets, just like Michael’s. “My bus got cancelled, it’s twenty minutes ‘til the next one. That sucks.”

Michael’s mouth betrays him instantly. “Want a ride?”

“It’s okay,” is the relieving reply. “I’ve got to nip to the shops before I get in. But... thanks.”

“Don’t sweat it,” Michael says into the freezing wind. “I’ll wait with you. I don’t gotta be home for anything.”

“ _Michael_ ,” says Gavin, with a hint of awe. “Thank you. That’s so nice of you.”

“Don’t sweat it,” he repeats.

“You want to listen to some music?”

“Are you getting withdrawal?” Michael jokes, accepting the earbud anyway. “Can’t make it eight hours without some One Direction?”

“ _One Direction?!_ ” Gavin squawks.

“They’re British, aren’t they?”

“Bloody… One Direction,” he repeats, shaking his head. “There’s Blur and Oasis. I got a bit of Bowie. Kate Nash and The Clash and Adele. Amy Winehouse.”

“Alright, Jesus, I get it,” Michael laughs, “just put on something nice. I’ve got a headache coming on, today was lethal.”

Gavin scrolls through his Spotify. “Something nice,” he murmurs.

_Dirty old river, must you keep rolling, rolling into the night…_

“Have you ever been?” he asks.

“Where?”

“Waterloo.”

“Oh, yeah,” Gavin says. “Loads of times.”

Michael bites his lip. “Do you… Do you miss it?”

“Oh, yeah,” says Gavin, but quieter this time. “All the time.”

It’s not poetic and it’s not climatic. They’ve got The Kinks in their ears, and Gavin just looks sad.

Michael nudges him with his shoulder, hands in pockets and all. A small show of solidarity. A little reminder that wherever Gav is, he’s at least with someone, and that someone might as well be Michael.

It’s fifty degrees out. Gavin is leaning against the bus stop, until he isn’t, because that’s when he leans a little more into Michael instead. Michael feels a cold arm link around his own, as though he unknowingly offered his elbow to a Victorian gentlewoman.

A scalding jet of anger bursts up his throat, and he violently shakes the arm away. Gavin immediately recoils.

“Shit, Michael, I’m sorry,” he’s already saying, and that’s when Michael kisses him.

He knocks out the earphone wires, for a start, and the abrupt silence is chilling. He doesn’t even grab or hold or cradle. He simply moves in a straight line until his mouth is against Gavin’s, breathless and chapstick-y, and wonders when his rational thought is going to come back.

There’s a delay in that last part, because Gavin springs to life and kisses him back. There’s cold thumbs moving gently back and forth over where Michael’s dimples would be, and Gavin’s _kissing_ him, open-mouthed and animated.

Christ.

Gavin’s kissing him.

At a bus stop.

“Oh my god,” Michael says, clipping his own heel slightly and hoping his brain will come back online soon. “Gavin, there’s beard hair in my mouth, what the fuck.”

Gavin makes a startling _pthhhwahhh_ sound as he puts his hands on his knees, wheezing hysterically and swaying. “You _kissed_ me,” he says, pointing.

“You kissed me back!” Michael protests. Then he thinks about it: “a _lot_ , actually. Damn.”

There’s a choke and a splutter, before Gav finally rights himself, still guffawing. He links his arm back in Michael’s.

“I’m tired of waiting,” he grins. “Let’s walk. Give me a ride to the shops, Michaelboi.”

“I’m not your fuckin’ taxi,” says Michael, and pulls until they set off towards the parking lot, still conjoined.

Not much changes after that. Life goes on in shifts, no matter where they end up walking.

“I’m hungry.”

“You want mixed nuts?”

“I’m not _that_ hungry.”

“Fuck you, then,” he decides, pulling back the bag.

“No wait,” Gav scrambles, “I’ll take a few, I’m just… snackish. Need some scran.”

He tips the bag up into Gavin’s palm. “Speak _English_ , Gavin, god!”

“I am!”

The indignancy is lost in a spray of muffled walnut dust.

Michael’s not quite sure what he sees in Gavin, but something about the way he talks about the world is understandable and yet completely antagonising.

Sometimes, when the rest of the department aren’t looking, he’ll take a second to rest his chin in his palm and forget about the screens and the keyboards and the internal phone calls. All there are in those seconds are images of Gavin’s scrunched up focusing face, and his weirdly long stray eyebrow hairs, and mismatched shoes bouncing to reggae beats under the desk. Last night, Michael threw a load of British eighties songs on a playlist haphazardly, just so Gavin could scroll through them and show him ones he likes on the car ride home.

“Hazelnuts taste like rain,” Gavin says, in the present.

He’s staring down at his handful with an oddly blank look on his face. Michael wants to strangle him.

**Author's Note:**

> My writing blog can be found [here](http://futureboy-ao3.tumblr.com/). 
> 
> Kudoses, comments, and subscriptions are appreciated! Cheers for reading. ♥


End file.
